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Faith Stories with Pastor Joe Coffey is a podcast about the real stories of real people and the real ways God moves in and through our lives. Each episode shares honest conversations of breakthrough and struggle–stories of faith, failure, drift, redemption, and the slow pull back to Jesus. From seasons of success to moments of darkness, these testimonies are reminders that no one is too far gone, no story is beyond redemption, and Jesus is still in the business of restoring what feels lost.
00;00;00;01 - 00;00;20;07
Unknown
Hey, welcome to Faith stories, the podcast from Christ Community Chapel about how Jesus can change anything and everything. I'm your host, Joe Coffee. And I'm here with my good friend Adriana Caso. I said that right, didn't I? You did? Yeah. I've known you for 30 years. I've always said caso what you always said with a little bit of a Z.
00;00;20;10 - 00;00;49;21
Unknown
Yeah, it's more Z. Yeah. All right. Adriana, you're the first artist that I've been able to interview. Oh, okay. So tell me first, when you got tell me about your family growing up, like. And then when you got interested in art, I can't remember a time when I wasn't interested in art. Like, you know, people would. All the kids would be playing outside, and I'd be, like, copying, you know, the funny papers or whatever.
00;00;49;23 - 00;01;10;29
Unknown
And so I was always that was always part of who I was. And an artist in your family? Well, my dad was a designer of sorts, so there was always an artistic thing in my family. I grew up in a typical Italian-American family, lots of wise guys. And like when you say wise, like lots of wise guys, you mean the real.
00;01;11;00 - 00;01;34;10
Unknown
Yeah. Really? Really. Yeah. Really wise youngest. Well, no, we weren't. We were from the Little Italy. Yeah. That the Cleveland area. So I didn't mean to get the families mixed up. Yeah. That's right. Yeah, they wouldn't like it, but, Yeah. So I, you know, I had one sister and mom and dad and, you know, grew up in near Shaker Heights and.
00;01;34;11 - 00;01;53;15
Unknown
Okay, you know, went to Catholic school, right. And when you got then you got interested enough in her. You decided to go to Italy. Well, if so, I started out, here in the States, and I went to a couple colleges. I went to the University of Miami for two years, and then I needed to go to an art school.
00;01;53;15 - 00;02;09;04
Unknown
So once the Cleveland Institute of Art and they had a sister program in Florence. And so I went and I was supposed to go for a semester, and I stayed there for a year and a half. And then they were like, well, we're not going to graduate you if you don't come back, so I did. Now, when you went over there the first time, did you already know some Italian?
00;02;09;09 - 00;02;32;22
Unknown
Just I knew my grandparents Italian, which was like a heavy southern dialect that meant nothing in Florence. And so it was almost harder because I had to, like, unlearn that and then learn Italian the right way. But luckily, I don't know, I just, I was so like I had dreamed about being there for so long that I really just jumped in to the whole thing.
00;02;32;22 - 00;02;57;19
Unknown
I also, like my whole life was an imitator, like I imitated people. And so I think that that helped learning the language. And so I but I walked around with my dictionary for the first six months for sure. And so you came home after and graduated. Graduated? Yeah. But then I won a full right scholarship to go back and get my master's degree.
00;02;57;19 - 00;03;17;23
Unknown
And so I got back because I just applied to that program because I just wanted to be back in Italy and I, you know, and you got it, I got it. And it's it's important to know that I was not a Christian. I was not a believer. Yeah. So you're pursuing art and art in will eventually be part of your redemption story?
00;03;17;24 - 00;03;46;27
Unknown
Yes. But at that time, art can, like most things, can take people further away or closer to, the one who created all things beautiful. So you for you, you went to Italy and were there to study. Are you in there for ten years? Yeah. Almost 11. So yeah, when I went back, you know, I went back and got my, my masters and then, you know, continued to live there and to work there and in the theaters.
00;03;46;27 - 00;04;04;20
Unknown
And I did scenery design, and I learned all kinds of cool things that, you know, I use now and the things that we do, but at that time, pretty far away from God. Oh, yeah, I think now when you grew up, you grew up Catholic. How do you feel about God growing up? I felt like he was a distant punisher.
00;04;04;21 - 00;04;30;14
Unknown
Okay. So I believed in him. I believed that he existed. But because I was just rebellious, I was rebellious from the time I was little. So, so, like, my sister wasn't. So she can experience the love of God in that context, but I could not. So, so so you living in Italy, you were believing in God, but even he was still the Punisher.
00;04;30;17 - 00;04;52;05
Unknown
The prodigal daughter. Yeah, because it was a really good place to be bad. Right. And and I took advantage of it. That's a great quote. A really good place to be there. All right, so you're there. You. And there you meet your husband, my ex-husband. Your ex-husband. Yes. That's where I met him. And how long were you there with Giovanni?
00;04;52;08 - 00;05;09;21
Unknown
You know what? I met him the last. Just the last, like two years, that I knew who he was, but I. I just met him the last couple of years that I lived there. So the whole all the time leading up to that, he wasn't really part of it. Why did you come back to the States? He wanted to come so.
00;05;09;26 - 00;05;30;29
Unknown
But it was also getting harder and harder to, you know, as out of school. By then I had my master's degree, my, my, my, my father, my parents had had funded, you know, all or helped fund all of that. And, and so, you know, you needed to do something. I needed to do something with that. And it was getting harder and harder to work there and get paid under the table, you know, getting paid under the table.
00;05;30;29 - 00;05;51;22
Unknown
And, you know, I didn't have citizenship. And even if you did, getting jobs, secure jobs and Italy was always tricky. So that was an issue as well. But he, he really he had visited with me once and then, you know, my dad had sold him on the American Dream because he really wanted me to move home. And so we did.
00;05;51;23 - 00;06;19;20
Unknown
Okay. So you moved back and you moved back into this area? I did. Now tell me, how is your your journey back to God start? Actually, it starts by getting my life getting worse than. Yeah. And so it did. Yeah. And so, we were married just a few years, and I had a son, my wonderful son, Eros.
00;06;19;22 - 00;06;50;05
Unknown
He was two and a half years old. And then my ex-husband started to distance himself from us. He started to disappear for days on end and that kind of thing. And so eventually, you know, he left and I had this tiny boy, and my dad died in the middle of it. But it was a long process and a slow like, pulling away from us and but and I and I sought help in lots of places.
00;06;50;05 - 00;07;11;06
Unknown
And the places that I did like. It just seemed to get worse and worse and worse and worse. And so I have a neighbor and she's a strong believer. And and she was very they were both her and her husband were just so precious during that time, even helping with my son and, you know, making sure I was okay and that kind of thing.
00;07;11;07 - 00;07;32;24
Unknown
And she just kept saying, you got to go talk to Joe coffee, Joe coffee, Joe coffee, Joe coffee shop coffee. And so like I did just to shut her up, though. Yeah. So you're a single mom now? For the most part. You, right, but not divorced. But I met you in the middle of it, right? Right. So before I was a single mom, you know, but he was gone.
00;07;32;28 - 00;07;53;29
Unknown
Most of the time, yeah. And how do you make an ends meet? At that time, he was still giving me some money. My parents were helping me out a little bit, and I was at the time, I was painting murals, so. But it was hard to do with a baby, you know, I had a baby. So, you know, it was very, like, hand to mouth.
00;07;54;01 - 00;08;19;13
Unknown
So what were the barriers that you felt like you needed to that needed to break down in order for you to see God as he really was, as he really is? I, I remember because you have a distorted view of God. Totally. And your life is a wreck at this point, right? And you need it needs to get all that needs to be fixed.
00;08;19;15 - 00;08;40;27
Unknown
Right? Healed. Yeah. And I know you don't want me to talk about you, but I just have to. So, like, there were two things that you did that, that God used you in, in such a powerful way. One was that from the day I met you, you talked to me in the we like. We are going to do this, this and this.
00;08;40;28 - 00;09;03;10
Unknown
We are going to pray this and that. We're going to and and so I didn't feel alone. And I think you still talk to me like that. And so that was 30 years ago and and but also like you started to know things about me in my life. Not good things, horrible things. And you weren't running away screaming, you know.
00;09;03;11 - 00;09;35;06
Unknown
And so what that did in me was like it slowly started to break away this idea that I couldn't be loved the way that I was or am. I talked to the in the men's summit. He talked about people. It was a shocking phrase. He said, people need more than Jesus. And what he was saying is Paul the apostle said, imitate me as I imitate Jesus, that sometimes you need someone right to at least well, and that's who you were.
00;09;35;13 - 00;09;53;15
Unknown
Yeah, that's a that's that's who you are. So when you, when you first opened the door to God. What was that like? It was not like a I didn't like, do this. It was like this crack. And then I'd shed a little bit. Then I opened a little bit more, a little bit more. It was really hard to believe.
00;09;53;19 - 00;10;12;18
Unknown
And I think I think too, that it had to be a man because it had to be a father like it. I had him like, make that correlation between the father, because I didn't have that experience with my own father. So like of like a truly loving kind of thing. I mean, he did love us in his way, but it wasn't a godly love.
00;10;12;18 - 00;10;19;28
Unknown
And so, so like I just think.
00;10;20;01 - 00;10;48;06
Unknown
I think back on those days, Joe, and the amount of time you spent with me was enormous because I kept doing this in this, you know, that kind of thing. And and also the saga of what was happening was like it seemed like it took forever, you know, and you stood, stood by me, and so did. And then you started to invite other people into the circle to help to and and women and to disciple me and all that.
00;10;48;06 - 00;11;18;01
Unknown
And so I just think that I had to let go of that God was far away, and that he he could never love me. Right. And so, I remember like the great exchange. And it was during because it was such a hopeless time, and it was during a Christmas concert in, in on Snow Road. And the kids came out to sing.
00;11;18;03 - 00;11;42;24
Unknown
And I remember feeling like this overwhelming sense of hope. And that was that was when I opened the door all the way. Yeah. You and you have one of the sweetest, most intimate relationships with God of anybody that I know well, which I really enjoyed watching. Blossom, what do you think the key has been for that growth?
00;11;42;25 - 00;12;12;07
Unknown
I mean, you it seems like from going from somebody who was distant from God, who saw God in a distorted way, who didn't talk to God. You talked to God all the time. Now, I think I just never forget where I came from and who I was and then who he's making me to be. So I think that, like, you know, that I, I just always have to remind myself of those things, right?
00;12;12;09 - 00;12;41;03
Unknown
Of how far. And I was really far. I feel like I made every bad decision there was to make, and, and and then, you know, he I was the one he came after. And so for me, like, the fact that I have the privilege to speak to him is just enormous. And so I take advantage of that. You know, I think prayer is such, such a sacred and a mysterious thing.
00;12;41;08 - 00;13;11;15
Unknown
And I love mystery and wonder. Yeah, that's what I want to get into to, is how you feel like your art has changed in your, your, almost theology of art, like you were very much in the circus and kind of stuff that was not, not godly, you know, I mean, I don't I don't know what I'm trying to say, but but now it seems like you see everything through a different lens.
00;13;11;21 - 00;13;31;27
Unknown
Yeah. That's true, I think. I think there was always a whimsical nature to my work, even when I was doing, when I wasn't a believer and making things about the circus. But there was also kind of like a cynicism to it, you know, a rough edge and, and kind of like take this, you know, kind of kind of feeling.
00;13;32;00 - 00;13;53;07
Unknown
But the circus, you know, I did circus themed work for a long time, 17 years, you know, and so, like, I really fell in love with that, that place. And like, it was my church, you know, it was this closed, kind of intimate place that where people loved each other and took care of each other. And I really longed for that.
00;13;53;07 - 00;14;25;28
Unknown
But I never could truly be part of it, you know, because I wasn't part of the circus. But, so, you know, it was like, I, I feel like it was a gateway, you know, to to church, to to the body of Christ because it was something that I, it was my, the God shaped hole. Right. And so, you know, as, as things started to shift, then God put me in a position where I was then, you know, painting in people's houses and doing commissions like that.
00;14;25;28 - 00;14;43;06
Unknown
And, and often I would struggle because sometimes they'd ask me to paint things that, you know, it was just like, if I paint one more grape, I'm going to lose my mind, you know what I mean? Like, because that was what that was. That was like the trend, you know, like that kind of thing. But I was glad to have the work and that kind of thing.
00;14;43;06 - 00;15;06;13
Unknown
But in my own personal work, I feel like I spent a lot of years after, you know, coming to Christ, facilitating others to make our work rather than making my own. Right, right. But I also made work for the body of Christ. Right. And I remember talking to you and saying, okay, if you want to, because you wanted to come to work at the church and stuff.
00;15;06;13 - 00;15;40;02
Unknown
And I was saying, okay, you have to create, create the ministry first. But I didn't know how, right? Neither one of us did really right. And it just God made it happen through students. And so that was such a beautiful thing of like, I mean, there are so many beautiful moments, but that that one, when the high school ministry went on to like some kind of thing in Chicago, it was some kind of conference, and they came back and they had seen art being used as worship and art being used to convey the gospel.
00;15;40;02 - 00;15;57;29
Unknown
And they were like, I know, we know just the person to ask. And so, you know, they asked me if I would be willing to do some of this stuff. And that's how a daughter was born. Okay. Now tell me your favorite thing about art now, wonder. I think that that I think beauty is a person and it's Jesus.
00;15;57;29 - 00;16;29;17
Unknown
And I think as artists we have, we have this privilege of wielding this beauty and telling stories that can open conversations, can create unity, can give people hope, can do all kinds of things like that. And I think that our our world is full of so much brokenness and so much darkness, and, and the world wants us to look at the darkness and stay there and not move through it like there's tons of darkness in the Word of God.
00;16;29;17 - 00;16;51;14
Unknown
Right? There's tons of it. We see it everywhere, but it's always moving through it. Now. Is is darkness easier in art? I know it's easier in movies. I remember reading a thing about Chariots of Fire, and they said the hardest thing was that Eric Little was such a good man. And good does not come off in movies where it comes off in in life it's much better than bad.
00;16;51;14 - 00;17;15;26
Unknown
But evil is much easier to capture in a movie and on a screen. Is that true of art? Is that I think that's true. Goes dark sometimes. Yeah, that's a good point. You know, I never really thought of it. And that context. So that's really interesting. I do know that it's it's much more popular. Right. So like I think that you can make more money with it.
00;17;15;27 - 00;17;45;10
Unknown
You can be more accepted, that kind of thing. So, so yeah, I think it's probably the same thing. Right. Like it's easier to do. I think it's harder to create beauty that isn't, you know, trite. Right? I think, but I think real beauty preaches it does. Right? I mean, it's got its own voice. And I remember reading in apologetics that beauty is one of those things that is the hardest for somebody who doesn't believe in God.
00;17;45;10 - 00;18;10;24
Unknown
To explain why is it that human beings are drawn to beauty, and why does it impact us the way it does? Right. And it's undeniable, right? Because the sun sets and it rises like it's it's undeniable. So, like, even those things I find so much wonder in those things that, you know, we have a God that makes the sun rise and set every day.
00;18;10;27 - 00;18;32;21
Unknown
How can we deny him? Right? How did I deny him? But I did. One of the things that I love about your story is that, that God redeemed you and redeemed your love and your passion. That's true. Right? He went. It wasn't like, oh, I'm going to redeem Adrianna, but she's got to give up this part of her.
00;18;32;21 - 00;19;04;03
Unknown
She was going, now I'm going to take what has been in her since that I put in when she was a little girl, and now I'm going to redeem it. Oh, that's a that's sweet way to put it. Yeah, yeah, I and I know that I'm redeemed in all those ways, but that's a sweet way to put it because I just, I remember being in a staff meeting and you were talking about the feast, so I, you know, here I was in this position, you know, pinching myself.
00;19;04;03 - 00;19;29;12
Unknown
How is this possible that I get to do this? And loving being able to help others make art and and see beauty and see worship in, in making art. But I felt like, well, I had squandered so much of my time making art that did not glorify God. And I thought, well, maybe I'll never be a, you know, God will never allow that again in my life.
00;19;29;12 - 00;19;54;18
Unknown
And I was okay with that. I was like, okay, that's all right, I get that. And then you were you were talking just like really casually about the Feast of Booths. And you, you talked about the candelabras and the, the, the, the 30ft, you know, candelabras and this giant flame and that, that the Israelites had made, you know, for the tabernacle and for the tent.
00;19;54;24 - 00;20;20;09
Unknown
And I was like, well, wait a minute. They learned those skills to make those things when they were slaves. And I just I just felt like the chains, like, fell off. And I was like, okay, get that paintbrush going. So all right, now, last thing, if you were going to talk to parents that have kids that are having artistic bent, what would you tell them to try to help them?
00;20;20;11 - 00;20;42;18
Unknown
Oh, that's a hard one. I wrestle with it because I think that, you know, going into the arts, the fine arts, especially in this culture and in this day and age, it's a really tough road to to make money, to make a living and that kind of thing. But at the same time, I feel like creativity is undeniable.
00;20;42;18 - 00;21;11;10
Unknown
So if there's children that have that desire to make those things, then they have to have an outlet to do it, because otherwise they'll just grow up. Couldn't, you know, using that energy somewhere, right? Right. Not good. And so I think that that, you know, I would just encourage as many outlets in that way when it comes to like profession I it's a long that's a bigger conversation.
00;21;11;11 - 00;21;32;02
Unknown
Yeah. I'm thinking more of just kids who go, oh, I love doing I love painting or trying to make a sculpture or whatever that just had the bent you had when you were a child. Yeah, like somebody who says, oh yeah, this is it's for the glory of God. Yeah. This is something that you are a role model that you don't know.
00;21;32;03 - 00;21;53;17
Unknown
Oh, right. You never you never think of yourself. No, I don't think that way. But what God has done is, is made you that through redeeming not just you, but the talent and the. Well, I think I think too, sometimes I've noticed sometimes with some of the families that will come into door to you can really simplify it.
00;21;53;19 - 00;22;20;29
Unknown
You can give kids, you know, cardboard boxes or like an, you know, to make things out of and be really creative in that way. And so I think to that I love to see when families do it together, when the parents aren't artistic, you know, it just seems like it makes sense, you know, give you a little commercial for a door to oh two is our visual arts ministry of it is it is Casso is the the head.
00;22;21;00 - 00;22;44;08
Unknown
Yeah. And and it's 20 years old in September. It's changed and morphed a lot over the years. But here we are. And so we are a community outreach. And we have open studio every Wednesday from 4 to 8. And it's I the best way to describe it is it's a giant art playground that CCE so generously funds and lets us do.
00;22;44;08 - 00;23;04;27
Unknown
And so we we're so grateful for that. And there's all kinds of materials, but it's analog. So it's not, there's not there's no technology there. We don't have a makerspace or anything like that. So, so with painting and sculpture and ceramics and that kind of thing. Thanks for sharing your story with us. Thanks for having me. All right.
00;23;05;01 - 00;23;06;02
Unknown
God bless.
00;23;06;04 - 00;23;30;27
Unknown
Thanks for listening to Faith stories. We do this podcast because we believe that Jesus can do anything and everything. So. You're listening to this episode and you feel like you want Jesus to do more in your life than you can reach out to us. You can find the address in the description of the podcast, but we would love for you to reach out because we want to meet you where you are and then take you further along with Jesus.
00;23;30;29 - 00;23;32;05
Unknown
Thanks again for listening.